Рита Браун - Cat's Eyewitness

"Be a cold day in hell, because the Urquharts live forever." Harry laughed.

"I thought of that. I expect that Dalmally will go to Stafford's children and to ours. We hope to have children. Mim's spoken to her brother in New York about all this. They're on the same page. But I hate to leave this place, I really do, even though Rose Hill is only another two miles down the road."

"It's a lovely, lovely place, and you two will make it your own."

"I expect Aunt Tally will drive us both crazy sometimes, but you know, she's a good woman. I'm glad to know her. She's a free thinker. To have that kind of energy at ninety-nine, she really has become one of my heroes."

"Mine, too."

He paused, watching a blue jay fly onto a tombstone, bitch and moan at the cats below, then fly off, dusting them with snow. "Jane Fogleman at Roy Wheeler Realty says I can ask one point two million and probably sell for a million, but—" Harry's face fell. He held up his hand. "You and Herb can't come up with that kind of money. Here's what I propose. You've saved me plenty. You laid out my pastures. Took me to the tractor dealers. Introduced me to the honest workmen and craftsmen in the county. You hauled me over to Art Bushey and got me a deal on two trucks. You even sat down and explained to me what a four-ten axle is compared to a lesser one and why I needed that to haul cattle although it would make for a bouncier ride. You spent weeks with me that one summer showing me the different kinds of cattle, the ratio of meat to bone. You were patient. You're a good friend to me. Let me be a good friend to you. I'll sell the farm to you and Herb for five hundred thousand dollars. I'll write you up a lease-to-buy contract for all my equipment. It will be simple, five thousand dollars a year. You maintain the equipment and you give me the right to borrow it from time to time should Aunt Tally's tractors or implements break down. How does that sound?"

Stunned, Harry opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

"Yes!" Mrs. Murphy spoke for her human.

"But we don't have the money." Tucker's brown eyes implored the tiger cat to think of something.

"You don't pass on a deal like that, Tucker. And she'll get the money. Risk drives people forward. This kind of scramble separates the sheep from the goats."

Her mind racing, Harry gulped the cold restorative air. She held out her hand. "Blair, I accept your offer. How much time do I have to raise the money?"

"If you can do it in four months' time, great. If not, a year."

"All right."

He touched a tree limb, low and so old the thickness of it was as big as a man's thigh. "I'm not a poor man. My profession, silly as it is, has made me a lot of money, but I'm a piker compared to the Sanburnes and the Urquharts. They must have triple-digit millions."

"Easily, but they're responsible people. They manage their wealth with wisdom and they're the mainstays of important charities."

"Oh, I know. I admire them but I keep asking myself, how do I raise children in this wealth and teach them that other children are starving?"

"Tally and Big Mim will pass that on. Take your cues from them, and you're good with people, you'll be good with children. Actually, I don't know how anybody does it. I can raise cats, dogs, horses, and cattle, but I don't know how I'd do with the human variety."

He beamed. "You'd do just fine. Probably have them cleaning tack by the time they could walk."

She laughed, a sense of relief and fear bearing on her with equal measure. "Blair, you're probably right."

As she walked back through the snow, passing the evergrowing beaver dam in the creek, she thought about how unpredictable was life. Then she laughed out loud because she was glad of it.

"Happy," Pewter, jumping from human footstep to human footstep, remarked.

"For once, she's taking a big chance. Even if she falls on her face, and I know she won't," Mrs. Murphy said, "this will be good for her. She'll finally make good in the world, the human world."

Once beyond the beaver dam, beyond the low hillock at a right angle to the pond the beavers had created, Harry noticed fox tracks heading to the den on the hillock. "Smart," she said to her companions.

"Too smart," Tucker replied.

Harry lifted her head. "Hey come on." She ran through the snow, breathing heavily. Snow wore you out.

Opening the door from the kitchen was Susan, and Harry reached it just as Susan was leaving. Before she could open her mouth to exclaim her good fortune, Susan grabbed her by the arm, pulling her into her own kitchen. She helped Harry with her coat.

"Susan, I can—"

"Harry, Ned ran a check on the Brother Love site. Ned forgot about it until this morning. He's on overload and gets forgetful. As an elected official Ned can get information from the phone company, from the Internet services that we can't. He can ask the sheriff to get information, too."

"What did you find?"

"Brother Love was Nordy Elliott."

"What?" Harry had one arm in her jacket, the other arm out, the jacket dangling to the floor as the cats attacked it.

"Nordy Elliott set up and ran the Web site." Susan became more clear. She was rattled.

"What a total creep."

"If Nordy set it up and now he's dead, there had to be someone else in on the deal." Pewter stated the obvious.

"I hate this," Mrs. Murphy said. It was all much too clever, almost catlike.

"Susan, we've got to get up on that mountain." Harry slipped her arm back into her jacket.

"Take your thirty-eight, Harry. I left the house in such a fit I forgot mine."

39

I'm listing to starboard," Harry remarked as she and Susan once again trudged through the snow. The cats and dog walked ahead of the humans since the thin crust on the snow, an eighth of an inch of ice, didn't break under their light weight. Harry and Susan crunched through, sank ankle deep in powder, lifted their boots out again, and kept going. Their thighs felt the effort after twenty minutes. The going was slow.

"I'm just listing," Susan grumbled.

"The gun. It's heavier than I thought," Harry replied. She'd slipped in her coat pocket the Les Baer competition series handgun, a .38 Super that Fair had given her for her birthday. Harry's hand—eye coordination was excellent. Fair knew she'd like target practice with the competition series gun, as it was extremely accurate and reliable.

A gaggle of buzzards turned their long necks to gaze at the five creatures fumbling in the snow. They'd settled on what was left of a deer. One huge bird stretched her wings wide, holding the posture.

"Jeez, that wingspread must be four feet." Susan respected the buzzard's task in life.

"Hope it's not an omen." Harry's right foot sank deeper into the snow than her left.

"That's a happy thought," Pewter, claws gripping the ice, said sarcastically.

"If these two think they'll be incognito up there, they're lunatics." Mrs. Murphy had to laugh.

"Mother knows she'll be spotted sooner or later. But coming this way at least they didn't pass through the gates. Mother's afraid she'll be stopped since Brother Handle and Brother Frank think she's a pest. And maybe she doesn't want to disturb the people praying at the statue," Tucker remarked.

"Tucker, why get on your knees in the snow?" Pewter thought the whole posture ridiculous.

"Slaves kneel. Freemen stand up," Mrs. Murphy commented.

"Huh?" Pewter gripped the ice again.

"In Roman times, a slave knelt before his or her master sometimes. So humans are showing the Virgin Mary they are her slaves. She's the boss," Mrs. Murphy deduced.

"I thought Christians weren't supposed to worship idols." Tucker found human religions baffling.

"They don't consider Mary an idol," Mrs. Murphy confidently replied.